Qualia
by Proper Decorum
Summary: A retelling of Galatea, a work of interactive fiction. Features some recap of info from the game, but mostly my interpretations. Background info might help, but probably won't be necessary.
1. Chapter 1

Well, this here would be my first ever stab at writing fanfics. Yay! So, this is based off the awesome text-based game Galatea, by Emily Short (and not by me in any way, mind you). While in the game the player gets to hold a conversation with Galatea as an art critic, I decided to write this from Galatea's point of view, and chronologically.

Teeny summary of game infos: Galatea, like in the Greek myth, is carved by Pygmalion. Then she comes to life, the reason for which is unexplained in the game. Also, in this universe, the technology to create artificial intelligence is being developed. That's why, eventually, people will stop freaking out that the statue can talk. Eventually.

Good luck with the reading and all...PLEASE REVIEW. (Criticism is good.)

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It started with a blurry awareness. She was blind, deaf, mute, and certainly incapable of movement, but she knew she was there. She could think, but she didn't know what to think about, with no experience of anything yet. Hearing was the first to manifest. Although, there admittedly was not much to be heard save for the muffled clinking sounds emitted by chisel and hammer. Next was touch, as he approached where the marble surrounding her ended and the concept of 'her' began. She remembers a slight sensation of pain as he scraped away excess marble to reveal her skin beneath. When he started on her eyes, she slowly gained vision. As he added more details on her smoky green eyes, she gained more acuity in her sight. When she, Galatea, was finished, she continued to stand there on her pedestal, watch the surroundings, and take in every detail. She watched the one she now knew to be the one who carved her, the one others called Pygmalion. He was described by the others who passed by as the tortured artist type, and she attached that label to him. She also observed the sea during that time. It filled her with a sense of wonder, that something not alive could appear so vibrant and powerful.

When Galatea left her pedestal for the first time, it seemed more natural than thinking. Her Creator was screaming, more so than usual, as he slept. She knew the cause of the screaming to be his nightmares, unpleasant things which were scattered by recalling the sufferer to the world of waking. Therefore, it stood next to reason that since Galatea was the only other being around - as usual, because he never kept company - she had to be the one to wake him up and relieve him of his discomfort. And that was what she did. She walked off the pedestal, glided over to where her Creator's body lay, still convulsing slightly, and gently shook him by the shoulder. "Wake up, wake up," she called to him using her voice she had never known she had. He woke, startled that he had someone other than himself in his dwelling. "Who are you?" He had started to ask, but once he had a good look at her, he needed no answer. After all, he was the one who knew her face best.

The days and weeks after that were pleasant, because she no longer had to stand all day as a statue was expected to. Not that Galatea felt any physical weariness, due to her lack of muscles and tendon. Rather, she was one of those souls that felt restless when there was a lack of things to do, just like her Creator was. She still did not speak much, but listening to her Creator talk and watching him intently satisfied her greatly. She tried to absorb everything he said to her, feeling important in her self-appointed duty as his confidante. He talked about his family, his troubled childhood, his gods, and everything else in between. She treasured the moments he spent talking to her as if she were the only being in the world that was accustomed to hear him speaking so openly. She even appreciated that she was the only witness to his "fits," as he called them. They made her the only one who knew of his more human, vulnerable side, while he played the part of irritable, stone-hearted artist for everyone else. She used to ask him if they could go down to the ocean, and he would chuckle and tell her she would sink like a stone. She didn't understand what it meant, but she was pleased she had got a chuckle out of him.

But in the end, Galatea could not comprehend humans. How desperately she tried, but to no avail. They were impulsive, and often would randomly do things that made no sense. For example, Pygmalion, himself a powerful cynic, had tried his best to explain the concept of love. According to him, or from what she seemed to glean from his explanation, love was a strange, damnable idea that usually left those who suffered from the ailment either making stupid decisions, or in tears, all for the purpose of making more people. When Galatea asked what purpose tears, drops of salt-water, falling from the eyes served, Pygmalion shrugged and told her, "maybe it makes us feel better?" and continued to clean off his tools. By "us," Galatea figured he naturally meant he and the rest of the humans. She thought she was better off not having a silly instinct like that.

At that moment, if Galatea could find a way to make salt-water fall out of her eyes, she would jump at the chance, for any possibility that would make her feel better. "Why, out of all my creations, are you alive?" Pygmalion accused her. "Can't you go back to being a statue?" She couldn't understand why, so suddenly, he'd resented her existence. 'Since when? How long have I been nothing but a burden to the only person I live for?' Galatea wished she could ask. But she couldn't. She stood, silent, like the statue he wanted her to be, even though both she and he knew it was too late for such gestures. She stood there, and took his pointed words that stung her insides, even though she knew there was nothing but marble there, just like on the outside. Instead, she thought about the days before today - the ones she had thought were contented and meaningful.

The next day, Pygmalion spent his time writing letters that Galatea discerned were addressed to prospective buyers. Buyers of sculpture, or art. They were coming for her. This crushed her. She pretended she knew nothing, and inwardly asked the gods to turn her back into a statue, take back her soul, and end the twisting, hollow pain that now consumed her.

The day after that, Pygmalion took his hat and went for a walk, but not before informing Galatea that some men would come around and inspect me, that it was a great honor, and that she should pretend there was nothing unusual about her for a while. She bit her lip as he told her all this, and fought back the spite and contempt rising in her chest. She said nothing as he walked out the door for the last time.


	2. Chapter 2

Ooookay...if you're still hanging on, I commend you and thank you from the deepest depths of my heart! -love- Anyway, here's the second chapter...

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Two buyers arrived, as Pygmalion said they would. One was short, with perfectly preened blond hair, certainly not from around Cyprus. He wore a pressed dress shirt, and dressy pants. He embodied the essence of the stereotypical art connoisseur snob. The other was taller, significantly, with tanned skin and scruffy black hair. He had a boyish smile, and a jaunt when he walked. Unlike the pretentious air the other exuded, this one had a humble aura. He dressed in a casual t-shirt, the sensible thing to do in the summer, and cargo shorts. Galatea liked the tall man significantly better.

Galatea vaguely entertained notions of sitting pretty for the buyers. Maybe, as her last favor to the man she owed everything to, she would let these men look her up and down, disgusted as it made her feel. The man gave her everything she had. On the other hand, he had thrown her away as soon as he was dissatisfied with her. A sense of injustice bubbled up again, and she tried to smother it quickly. She gave him all of her heart, everything she had belonged to him. But he never gave her anything more than a life, a soul. And did he even mean to? He did not. He did not love her, as she loved him.

After this realization, there was no bond holding Galatea to her loyalty to Pygmalion. Who was he to hold her down, now that he had practically abandoned her to the winds? "So? What do you think?" She asked the two.

"What?" The shorter one asked the taller one.

"I didn't say anything." The taller looked back at him.

"Hello, darlings." Galatea chimed in playfully, moving her head to follow them around the room as they both instinctively took steps back.

"Miles. Did _that _just _speak_ to us?" The shorter man stammered as he held a quavering finger towards Galatea. She huffed.

"I'm not a _thing_, if that's what you seem to think. I'm a good and proper lady, and I have a name." She sniffed at the blonde man she didn't really like.

"I believe _she_ did indeed speak to us, Gerald," the taller man replied and turned to Galatea, beaming. "Greetings, fair lady. And what is your name?"

Galatea smiled. She _did _like this one. "I'm Galatea. Nice to meet you, Miles. And…Gerald?" She stuck out her hand for Gerald to shake, but that was too much for the poor man's nerves. He straightaway fainted. "Oh my. That was an accident." She chuckled. She offered out her hand to Miles, cautiously.

He, in turn, took her hand cautiously and shook it. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Galatea." She was aware of how he tried to understand what she was, first by feeling the texture of her skin. "…Are you really…?" He began, but decided against it, for the sake of tact.

"I am exactly what I seem to be. Are you here to buy me? How much am I worth?" She inquired curiously, lightly, as if only to change the subject.

"More than we thought, in light of recent events…" he chuckled. "So, you _are _marble?" He regressed.

"Just as you are flesh and bone." She yawned offhandedly.

"So how do you…_move_?"

"How do _you _move?" She stepped off the pedestal and looked him in the eye. He broke eye contact, clearly unnerved, and looked down at Gerald. "He probably needs some attention, if he hasn't come to by now. Then again, I'm not a real expert on human reactions to shock." She motioned toward the unconscious man and glided away to find some kind of tarp or something that would cover her naked body. In the presence of two men, it didn't seem quite respectable, although Galatea couldn't decide whether she cared or not. Miles seemed rather surprised to see her move about so casually and intently watched her gracefully walking around the studio rummaging in drawers, instead of tending to Gerald. The silence grew and grew until he asked, "how did you come to be? I mean, your consciousness."

She was surprised that Miles was capable of asking such dull questions, and replied, "Do you remember being born, Miles?" with a hint of unintended derisiveness. He seemed to understand the source of her annoyance, and colored. Galatea found her tarp and wrapped it about her like a cloak. "Well, don't let me being alive stop you from doing your job, Miles. Take me away. It's not like this is human trafficking, anyhow." From her tone of voice that suggested she was done discussing things with these people that would only interrogate her with questions she had not answers to, the conversation had ended. Miles sighed, and finished inspecting her, something made much easier with her somewhat cooperative mood.

"You're a fine piece of work, you know. The lines and contours on you were obviously carved with a lot of care. You're worth no small sum." He announced when he was finished. "Yes, I think it'll be quite easy to find a buyer for you..." Galatea, by this point, was struggling with the idea of leaving her birthplace, the place where her Creator had so meticulously carved her out. If Miles was right, why did Pygmalion decide to abandon her? Again, she wanted to cry, she wanted to forget everything and go back to being a statue. Miles prodded her, vying for a response. He received none. He kept trying, but to no avail. She had retreated back into herself and become merely a statue, but he knew of no such thing. Left halfway between forcing himself to believe Galatea was not just marble, and common sense laughing in the face of his suspicions, leading him to think it was all a hallucination caused by the heat, Miles woke Gerald eventually, and together they hoisted Galatea into the truck they had brought with them, whisked away and sold, and from there she departed the country where she was born, the first place that she experienced the heartbreak and constant disappointment she would soon grow to expect.


End file.
